Giving Up Breathing
by RainbowBetty
Summary: Dean almost drowns in a hotel pool. Is it connected to whatever is causing the rise in local drownings, and does one brother have to die to stop it from killing again? Early season 2.
1. Chapter 1

His foot must have slipped.

_The beer in his hand slips free and the glass crashes to the aqua tile, glinting off the chlorinated surface as it shatters into a thousand pieces. _

Or something pulled him – backwards.

_It's like slow-motion as the smile on Dean's face transforms from the smart-ass comment he was about to make into something like horror as he feels himself falling, and his arms fly out to catch at nothing._

When his head hit the concrete edge of the pool, it was the sound, more than the sight of blood spanning out like ribbons through the clear water, that made Sam's stomach clench and his heart leap into his throat.

He lurched toward his brother floating face-down in the shallow end of the pool. He jumped in, feet first, frigid water hitting hard and stealing the breath from his lungs as soon as his shoes connected with the slippery concrete below, and plastering his clothes to his skin, weighing him down like too many extra limbs. He fought the water's extra pull along with Dean's still form, and wrestled his brother's unconscious body up over the ledge of the pool, trailing rivulets of pool water from his saturated flannel shirt, jeans, and boots.

He thought he could hear himself ordering someone to call an ambulance, not sure where his own voice was coming from.

He heard someone ask if the man was breathing, and Sam almost lost it. Because he wasn't. And couldn't lose Dean, not like this. Not in a stupid hotel pool drowning.

And then all at once, his father might as well have grabbed him by the shoulders and smacked him hard across the face, because he snapped back together, pressing his fingers against the side of Dean's throat and digging in to try and find a pulse. Dean's skin was too cold, too pale, and there was no rush of blood where there should have been a pulse beating under his fingertips. Only the slow trickle of blood from the gash in his forehead, bright red smearing and spreading as it joined with the wetness of the pool water clinging to Dean's scalp.

"No. No, come on!" he urged Dean.

He yanked Dean's shirt apart, baring his chest, threaded his fingers together and started counting out compressions. There were tears in his eyes. This wasn't right. When he saw his brother's chest, it was the familiar sight above a towel every morning after Dean stepped out of the shower. It was the thing he smacked when Dean teased him. The thing he shoved against when they fought. The solid wall of comfort he'd laid against when he'd had a fever and couldn't get out of bed to throw up. He wanted to throw up now. He wanted this not to be happening.

He stopped and tilted Dean's head back, pinched his nose shut and pressed his mouth over his brother's pale, bluish-tinged lips, forcing air into Dean's lungs. He breathed in again through his nose, and then again for Dean, silently begging him to catch on and pick up the rhythm on his own.

He felt a shudder run through Dean, and then he turned to his side and coughed. Sam gasped with relief and dropped back on his heels. Applause erupted from the small group of onlookers that had gathered outside the hotel, and Sam looked up in shock, not even aware that they had drawn a crowd.

A fist connected with his jaw, and Sam tumbled backwards.

Dean, still too pale, dropped back against the tiled surface along the edge of the pool, breathing hard, eyeing Sam and massaging his right hand.

Sam touched the sore spot where he'd been punched, tentatively working his jaw. "Dean? What the hell!"

"Rule number one, Sammy." His voice was rough, and Sam could see the interplay of fear and gratitude in his eyes that he'd never voice. "Mouth-to-mouth requires a hot lifeguard."

Sam shook his head, pushing himself back up to his knees beside his brother. "Man…seriously? You can save yourself next time!"

"I mean, doesn't have to be _Baywatch_ hot. Just passable hot."

"You know your _heart_ stopped, right?"

Dean held out his hands. "Rules are rules. I don't make the rules. And I mean, sorry man, but you just don't qualify."

"Oh, _okay,_ Dean." Sam rolled his eyes. "Sorry I violated 'hot lifeguard rule number one' by saving your freaking life."

Dean nodded solemnly, then looked up at Sam and frowned, all traces of levity gone. "Hey, Sam. Pretty sure something grabbed my leg."


	2. Chapter 2

"There were seven fatalities ruled accidental drownings in this county alone within the last two years," Sam said, his eyes intent on the screen of his laptop. He clicked a link that took him to the next open tab. "Four in the year before that."

Dean's arm brushed against his in the reach for his whiskey glass on the table, and Sam quickly moved his elbow in and out of the way.

"Jumpy?"

Sam shot him a look. "My jaw still hurts. Don't talk to me about who's jumpy."

"Aw," Dean mocked with a wide grin. "Do I punch too hard?"

"Shut up. Seriously."

Dean indicated the laptop with a tip of his glass before draining it. "So that's, what? Eleven drownings inside three years? That's a little high. Any of them at the pool here?"

Sam shook his head. He opened a new browser and typed in a search, looking for correlations. There didn't seem to be any. All of the victims were different ages, from unrelated backgrounds and no common links. Then, Sam's eyes narrowed.

"Dean, get this. Three of the people who died were twins."

"Three? I thought they came in sets of two." His eyes took on a dreamy, faraway look. "_Awesome_ sets of two."

"Dude. Can you focus a second? No, I mean that of the drowning victims, three were twins who _left_ a surviving twin behind. That's a weird coincidence."

"So this is something supernatural picking off twins, and the rest of the deaths are just accidental drownings?"

"Maybe, but…" Sam's fingers tapped over his keyboard, his brow locked in concentration. "Okay, wait. Mary Wright, age 62, she and her husband just celebrated their fortieth wedding anniversary. Steve Patterson, engaged to his high school sweetheart who he'd known since childhood. Here's an interview with another girl's best friend who goes on and on about how she and the victim were 'closer than sisters.' And here. Same thing. This guy says he lost a friend who was 'like a brother' to him.

"I'm not sure I see it, Sam. Those are the kinds of things you _say_ when somebody close to you drowns."

"But not like this, Dean. Look." He turned his screen so that Dean had a view of a news article showing a picture of a crowd gathered at the scene of a pool very much like the one at their hotel. At the forefront was a distraught, middle-aged woman, her clothes and hair soaked, clutching a bundle of wet clothing to her chest. "That's Gloria Beckham. She tried to save her sister from drowning but couldn't. Her sister died in her arms. Dean, each of these deaths happened right in front of the person they loved most. And they weren't able to stop it."

Dean looked at him. "You okay? I mean, you're not reading something into this because of… earlier?"

"You _said_ you felt something grab your leg. Were you imagining that?"

"No. Fine. I'll call Bobby, see if all this rings any bells."

* * *

Dean snapped his phone closed and walked back across the motel parking lot toward Sam. Sam was leaning against the iron grate outside the pool, watching a handful of kids splashing each other and looking pensive.

"Anything?" Sam asked.

"He agrees it's weird, and he'll call us back after he has some time to look into his books on mermaids or water goblins or whatever else it could be."

"Mermaids, really?"

"Yeah, I don't know. Listen, Sam?"

"Hmm."

Dean frowned. He reached up and touched the bandage covering the raised swelling on his forehead. "Never mind. Forget it. Hey, wanna hit the bar while we wait for Bobby's call? I know I could use a drink."

"You've _been_ drinking."

"Don't judge."

"Nah, I'm good, actually. Go ahead though if you want. I'll keep going on the research end back at the room."

Dean made a fist at his side, knocking it against his leg. "Yeah… okay. See you back at the room, then."

_Don't be weird,_ Dean told himself. Little brother or not, Sam was a big boy. He could take care of himself next to a pool. He took a few steps toward the car.

Still. Something _had_ pulled him in.

He stopped and turned back to Sam. "Come with me," he insisted.

_"Dean."_

"Come on, Sam. Brotherly bonding. One hour, tops. You owe me at least _one_ drink for the tongue you slipped me."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Gross."

* * *

_To be continued._


	3. Chapter 3

Sam let the ambient noise from the bar settle around him like a familiar soundtrack, casually inspecting the tip of his pool cue and reaching for the cube of blue chalk. Dean chewed his lip in mock concentration before announcing, "I'mma bank it, Sam! Corner pocket. Watch me, I can make it this time."

Too loud. Too cocky. A little bit drunk. That was how his brother's voice carried, catching the notice of the players at the next table. Sam stifled a smile and played it straight for the benefit of the hustle they were setting up. He shook his head. "You've never made that shot, Dean. Not even sober."

Their eyes met for a split second as Dean was lining up the shot he wouldn't make. In that instant, Dean's eyes smiled at him without smiling. It was a look he seemed to reserve only for Sam, a silent nod to the volumes of history between them, something secret and shared.

Dean was safety in a life that promised none. He was the only sure and predictable thing Sam had ever known.

_Dean was cold, wet skin that slid under his hands. No pulse. No breath._

Sam's own breath caught, suddenly seeing Dean's green eyes go dead and lifeless underwater.

He was about to open his mouth to say he wanted to head back to the room when a woman's voice called out, "Hey, you're that guy!"

Sam and Dean both turned in the direction of it. A short, dark-haired girl in her mid-twenties was looking directly at Sam, her face an open expression of admiration.

"I…" Sam started. "What?"

"At the pool!" she went on. "You saved his life. I saw you go in after him. You were amazing!" She turned to Dean and added, "That was amazing, right? What he did? He saved you!"

Dean grinned, looking as entertained by the girl's enthusiasm as he was by the flush of embarrassment that was creeping over Sam. "Absolutely," Dean agreed. "That's my kid brother! Genuine hero, this guy. Saves lives every day of the week. Don't you, Sam? Not the first time he's saved mine, either."

_"Really?"_ the girl gushed.

Sam glared at Dean, and his brother's grin widened with mock innocence. "Don't be modest, Sammy. Tell her!"

Mercifully, the ringer on Dean's phone went off, and Dean slipped it out of his pocket to glance at the display. "Bobby," he said to Sam. "We better take this. You settle up?" He gave a friendly nod to Sam's admirer on the way out as he picked up the call.

Sam gritted his teeth. "I'm really sorry about that," he said to the girl, reaching into his wallet for a twenty and laying it on the bar.

"What for?" she asked honestly. "Your brother seems really proud of you."

"Oh, I'm sure he is. He just…" Sam struggled to find the words. "That was just him trying to get a rise out of me."

"By saying nice things about you?"

It didn't make sense to try and explain it, that their relationship was a delicate balance of ribbing, banter, favors returned, and things left unsaid that didn't need saying. Maybe other people came right out and said how they felt about each other. But not them. And that was okay, as far as Sam was concerned. He felt the certainty of it without words, in the way Dean looked at him, smiled without smiling.

* * *

"Might as well put me on speaker. You're gonna make me repeat this if you don't."

Dean made a face but he clicked the speaker button his phone, laying it on the table in the hotel room between him and Sam. "Okay, Bobby. You're up."

Bobby's voice filtered through the cell, sounding tinny and far away but still as authoritative as ever. "You boys are gonna need to get ahold of a few things."

As he began listing both familiar and unfamiliar items, Sam grabbed a pen and wrote them down as quickly as he could. "What's all this for?" he asked.

"It's a spell. A tricky one," Bobby said. "Now listen. I think you're dealing with a type of water nymph. Normally they're attached to a body of water – you go near it, it'll draw you in. But this one acts more like a moth. Same way a moth is drawn to bright lights, this thing is attracted to love."

"Love?" Dean looked skeptical.

"It makes sense," Sam said. "All of the victims were in close long-term relationships."

Dean brought his hands together to rest under his chin. "So, water nymph, sees two people in love, snuffs one of them out. Why?"

Sam bolted up straight in his chair, his eyes widening at Dean. "Oh, wait. Whoa," he said. "Hold on. That doesn't..."

Dean looked at him questioningly. Sam shot him an intense _you-know-what_ look.

"What?" Dean said finally.

_"Dean_. It went after you. We're not… _you know!"_

Dean instantly caught on, his expression matching Sam's. "Oh. _No!_ Bobby?"

"Don't be stupid," Bobby said. "I didn't say it went after people _in_ love. Put it in whatever bro-speak you want, you two idjits are as close as two people get, always have been."

"I'd rather not put it in _any_ kind of speak," Dean muttered. "You didn't see the lip-lock Sam had on me earlier."

Sam reached over and whacked him in the arm, hard.

"Are you both done?" Bobby demanded.

"Ask Sam," Dean said innocently. "He started it."

Bobby cleared his throat and then went on. _"So._ What I was trying to tell you is, this thing zeroes in on powerful love relationships – _whatever_ kind of love that might be," he added, cutting off the anticipated objection. There was a moment of uncomfortable silence. Sam shifted in his seat, and Dean pointedly avoided eye contact.

"Is there _any way_ you could use a different word?" Dean asked.

"Look, you get the idea," Bobby said. "And that's not even really the point. It's not the _'l-word'_ it's after anyway. It's the _grief_ it leaves behind."

Sam swallowed, flashing back to the moment of terrible hopelessness he'd felt when he couldn't find Dean's pulse.

Dean's heart had stopped. Dean could have died. It had meant Dean to be dead, meant to take Dean from him, to leave him without his brother, his safety, his stability, his _life._

"It's like a food source," Bobby was saying. "It kills off one half of a duo right in front of the other, and the grief and loss that the other one experiences becomes like a—"

"How do we kill it?" Sam cut in.

"Hang on, son. I'm gettin' to that," Bobby said. "Because that's where the tricky part comes in. To kill it, you're gonna have to lure it and trap it. And essentially starve it to death."

"Okay, we can do that," Dean said. "How?"

"Well." They could almost hear Bobby shrug. "Either of you feel up to dying?"

* * *

_To be continued._


	4. Chapter 4

Sam looked like he'd just swallowed something awful. "Not funny, Bobby."

Bobby went on. "That spell I gave you will _mimic_ death, giving you a small window of time where the person can survive in a coma-like state until the spell is reversed. Your breathing, heart rate, all normal functions will all be so low as to be virtually undetectable."

"So," Dean said, "you're talking about playing possum."

"That's the idea," Bobby affirmed. "Trick the nymph into thinking she's killed one of you, and then leave her hanging for the inevitable sob-fest that's sure to follow. After a few minutes of not getting anything out of you, she should start to waste away to nothing."

Dean tapped his fingers against his leg. "Okay, but won't this nympho-thing _know_ if we're not really dead? I mean, it kind of sounds like she's into doing this professionally, you know. Offing people."

"It's a spell. It's _designed_ to put one over on folks. _Professionally."_

Sam cleared his throat. "Just to be clear, Bobby," he said. "There's… no question of us being brought back, right? The spell can definitely be reversed."

"Boy. Do you think I'm that much of a moron?"

Dean stifled a grin. "Awesome," he said, picking up and reading over the list of items Sam had written down. "What do I have to do to make this work?"

"No. Me. I'm doing it," Sam said curtly. He looked at Dean and saw his brother's face set in a way that meant he was already digging in his heels. "Dean," he started.

"Absolutely frigging not," Dean said. "If either of us is doing this, it's me."

"You don't get to just decide that."

"The hell I don't."

"Okay, look," Bobby interrupted. "Have your little pissing match on your own time. Either way, whichever one of you _doesn't_ do the spell has to stand by and keep a lid on your emotions long enough for the nymph to die off. She should be toast within a few minutes, and you'll have ten good minutes before you absolutely have to administer the counterspell."

"Ten minutes before what?" Dean asked, suddenly liking the plan less. "What happens after ten minutes?"

"The same thing that would happen if you didn't pull someone out of the water in time. Just don't let it go that long."

Dean chewed the inside of his lip. After a beat, he said, "Got it. Thanks, Bobby." He ended the call.

Dean looked across the table at Sam. "No," he said just as Sam was opening his mouth.

"Dean, listen."

"Sam—"

"Okay, wait. Just wait." Sam stood up next to his chair and held out a fist. "We'll throw for it. Rock paper scissors. Winner does the spell, deal?"

Dean shook his head. "Really, Sam?"

Sam nodded insistently. So Dean shrugged. And threw scissors.

* * *

"Son of a _bitch,"_ Dean muttered, jamming his hands into his pockets and instinctively feeling for the folded piece of paper that held the words to the counterspell.

Sam met his eyes and gave him a half-hearted smile. It was meant to be reassuring, Dean knew, but all it did was ratchet up the tension. There was nothing to do in that moment but wait. Not with guns drawn and a plan of action, but rather a plan of _inaction_, which felt like every kind of wrong.

Sam was standing a few feet in front of him with his back to the pool, its dark, still surface reflected calmly behind him in the warm night air, and after-hours security lights cast long shadows over the rows of neatly stacked deck chairs and tightly closed patio umbrellas.

"Dean," Sam said uneasily, breaking the silence. "How long has it—"

_It's like slow motion, with his eyes on Sam's face seeing the transition from surprise to fear to the realization of what's happening. That they planned this. That something is pulling him down, back, underwater, and that Dean can't__—_won't—help.

"Sam!"

The moment Sam hit the water, his entire body went unnaturally limp, and Dean stopped breathing at pretty much exactly the same moment. He had to force himself to draw his next breath, and he started counting seconds in his head because otherwise his thoughts would disintegrate into an irrational stream of_ no-no-no-no_ and he needed to _shut that down._

He looked down at the ground in front of him, away from Sam floating face-down and unmoving in the cold, dark pool, which felt wrong, so very wrong. He locked his hands into fists at his sides and focused everything he had on the idea that Sam was fine—would be fine.

_Take care of your brother, Dean. Take care of Sammy._

Dean was almost knocked over by a rising swell of panic.

What the hell was he doing?

He struggled to regain his hold on the idea that Sam was fine.

But no, screw that. Screw everything. He was putting his brother's life on the line, and for what? This was insane. He was probably already too late. They didn't have any assurance that the spell even worked. Was he supposed to stand there and watch Sam drown.

He needed to get Sam out of the water. Now.

Dean made a move toward the pool, and then stopped, the hair on the back of his neck rising.

He was acutely aware of the feeling of being watched.

* * *

_To be continued._


	5. Chapter 5

Dean froze, his eyes still on Sam face-down in the water but all other senses alert to the presence of _something_, its unseen eyes watching his every move.

"Ah ha," he said to the air around him. "Got you."

He took a purposeful step backwards, away from the edge of the pool.

Suddenly, a breeze picked up out of nowhere, rippling the surface of the water. The water continued moving past the point when it should have stilled after the breeze, shimmering and gathering and pulling itself up into a human form sculpted from water. Long, flowing water-hair framed delicate features and swirling gauzy robes of water surrounded its long, elegant limbs and sinuous body. Dean couldn't help but watch, captivated, as the nymph shimmered into focus in blue and silver like liquid light bonded in female form.

She looked down at Sam and then up at Dean with a puzzled expression.

"Oh, you're not getting anything out of me, sweetheart," Dean assured her.

All at once, her face contorted into a snarl, and she snapped at Dean with sharp teeth bared, her eyes gleaming a piercing blue. Dean stumbled back another step in surprise and reached instinctively for his gun in the waist of his jeans, wondering how he would fight her off, but she never left the surface of the water. She simply glared and snarled at him, twitching, looking between Dean and Sam expectantly.

He noticed that she seemed to be wavering in and out, dimming in brightness, her glances between them growing more and more anxious.

Which was good. Because Dean didn't have any idea how much time had passed and he didn't know how much longer he could keep telling himself he didn't need jump in after Sam.

Then she opened her mouth wide, and _wailed_.

The wail rose in pitch to a shriek that made Dean wince, and then with final cry and a burst of blue light, the nymph shattered and fragmented into thousands of tiny water droplets, collapsing and raining back down as water into the pool.

Dean wasted no time in plunging forward into the shallow water after his brother. He seized Sam roughly by the arms and flipped him over onto his back as he dragged him toward the ledge, not liking how pale he was or how blue his lips were, or the fact that he wasn't breathing. He knew the spell was intended to mirror death, but this was a little too realistic, and it was just the spell, right? It was just the spell making Sam look like this. It wasn't because he was too late. It _wasn't._

Dammit, how much time had passed?

Sam's arms folded over his chest like a rag doll when Dean laid him down on dry ground, and there was nothing in him, no hint of movement or warmth to promise that he was just a spell away from waking up. His head rolled to the side against the concrete, and Dean instinctively put a hand on Sam's cheek and smoothed a hand over Sam's forehead in a uselessly reassuring gesture that he was sure Sam couldn't feel, but he just needed to _fix_ Sam, take care of his brother, that was all he knew.

"Come on, man. Nap time's over," he urged, feeling his pocket for the slip of paper on which he'd written the counterspell.

His stomach plummeted.

His jeans were soaked through, and so was the piece of paper in his pocket. "No…" he said, feeling it slide wetly between his thumb and fingers as he pulled it out. "No, no, _no_…"

His hands shook as he peeled the folded sides apart that were plastered wetly together, whether with fear for Sam or rage at himself for being so _stupid_ he wasn't sure, and wasn't sure it mattered.

The ink had smudged and bled, and the Latin words smeared together in a confusing mix of possible consonants and vowels. His eyes tightened in concentration, mouthing over the words and trying to tried to remember hearing Sam say them out loud as he wrote them down.

"In extumus…" he read, "transitus… _shit."_ He squeezed his eyes shut and inhaled.

He took his best guess and read what he thought were the right words.

He waited a long moment. "Sam?" he whispered.

Sam remained still as death. Dean's chest constricted with fear.

"Oh dammit, come _on!"_ he shouted.

He tried reading it again, transposing the questionable vowels with plausible ones. Then again. And again.

"Sammy, please."

_Help,_ he thought desperately. _I need..._

An echo of memory teased the edges of his mind. Sam's voice. _"There's… no question of us being brought back, right?" _And Bobby's voice answered, _"Boy. Do you think I'm that much of a moron?"_

Bobby.

He put a hand on his back pocket, felt his phone there through the wet fabric and dug it out, praying that the water hadn't fried the electronics. Miraculously, the screen lit up. He dialed Bobby with his pulse hammering in his throat. "The spell, Bobby," he blurted without context. "The—the _counterspell!_ The paper got wet, and I can't—Sam, he's not, I need you to—"

"Hang on," came Bobby's terse reply.

Dean barely breathed. It had been too long since he'd last seen Sam take a breath.

"Okay," said Bobby, "Say this…"

Dean repeated the spell with the phone pressed to his ear, clutching it like a lifeline, and then held his breath again.

Sam's eyes flew open, immediately meeting Dean's in a mix of confusion and panic. He clutched Dean's arm and convulsed in a fit of coughing.

"Hey. It's okay. 's okay, I got you," Dean breathed, bringing his brother in close. "Bobby-"

"Yeah, that's what I'm here for," the older man said, and if there might have been an _idjit_ tacked on to the sentiment as Dean ended the call, Dean didn't notice.

He helped Sam sit up, and found himself overwhelmed with an odd mix of relief and fury. Some part of him had an irrational urge to punch his brother for scaring the shit out of him, while another urge, just as irrational, was making him want to bury his face in Sam's chest and weep.

"Dammit, Sam," he swore, doing neither, just clutching Sam's arm.

Sam was breathing hard, pressing a hand to his sternum. "Feels like… got kicked in the chest," he wheezed. "What happened, you get it?"

"Yeah," Dean said, his eyes on the ground beside Sam. "Yeah, we got it."

"What's wrong?"

Dean shook his head. "That was stressful."

Sam cocked a grin. "Stressful?"

"Shut up. You had it easy, all you had to do was play dead."

Sam laughed, wrapping his arm around his middle. "Ow."

"Oh, _laughing_ hurts?"

"Dean, don't. Seriously." But he was smiling. And Dean grinned mischievously, then stood and held a hand out to his brother which Sam accepted gratefully.

* * *

Sam wasn't sure why he'd thought Dean would want to talk about it. _Want_ was probably too strong a word. He knew his brother better than that.

But he wasn't blind or stupid, and he wasn't a kid anymore. He'd been watching Dean white-knuckling his way through Dad's death, shouldering past anything that felt too raw or real to deal with.

Dean was a bottle corked too tight, and Dean wasn't ever going to uncork his own crap, Sam knew that. He was going to keep shoving it down until it blew.

Maybe what this hunt had given him, then, was an opening. An opportunity to catch his brother in a conversation and pry out a bit of what he was holding on to.

"Coffee," Sam announced, holding up the two take-out cups by way of explanation as he backed his way into the motel room, letting the door swing shut behind him.

Dean grunted in answer. He'd just come out of the shower and was digging through his bag for clothes. He found a white t-shirt and pulled it on over his head.

Sam set Dean's cup down on the table between the beds, and Dean looked over at him and then groaned. "Oh, hell, Sam. _What?"_

"What?"

"You have that look, like you didn't just go get coffee. You got the coffee so you could make me sit here and _not_ go get coffee. So _what?_ What is it?"

Sam looked taken aback but slightly impressed at the accuracy.

"You almost died, okay," he said softly, not quite looking at Dean. "And then. I don't know, I wasn't there, I don't know how it went while I was out before you brought me back, but honestly Dean? You seemed pretty rattled."

He did look up at Dean then, and Dean's expression immediately closed off but not before Sam was sure he saw something vulnerable there, just behind the wall. "I just," he tried, "I want you to—"

"Hey, we ganked the monster, Sam. And we're both fine."

Sam looked at him searchingly. "Are we?"

"Yeah," Dean said, all defenses firmly in place. He came over and clasped a hand briefly on Sam's shoulder, picking up his cup before heading across the room in search of a clean pair of socks.

Sam looked down at the cup in his own hands and smiled to himself. "Yeah, right," he muttered. "Jerk."

"Bitch," Dean shot back automatically, and Sam didn't even need to see Dean's face to know that he was smiling too.


End file.
